Another week
Has just flown by. It’s been too hot to do anything here, I’ve spent most of the time reading and trying not to doze off: ‘ The Green Mile’ in French and we’ve had a few noisy thunderstorms since I started reading. How’s that for organizing special effects?

Last Friday evening we went over to Beatrice (the lady who made the sign for our house) and Mark’s for a meal. We had kebabs made from duck and ate in their lovely garden . Beatrice decided last year that they would rent out their house to English holidaymakers. The agency she’s using told her she wouldn’t get many bookings the first year, so to put the house up for the whole summer. Would you believe, they can’t go home for over a month and have had to search desperately for places to stay? We’ve been asked to do pool maintenance twice during August. Mark knows that Rob and I are about as practical as a chocolate fireguard so he must think we’re up to it. It looks pretty complicated to me, but he is leaving printed instructions. I’m sure I’ll fall in.

Mark and I had a very interesting conversation about Islam. He’s in the army and one of his colleagues is a member of the French national front. The nf have issued booklets explaining the Koran to it’s members, a la nf, of course. Well this person was really getting on Mark’s nerves going on about how evil it all was, so he went out and bought a copy of the Koran to read for himself. I shall be interested to see how he gets on, I have a copy myself but got about as far reading it as I did with the Bible.

Auntie M is packing up and leaving Paris with her family. They are returning to the U.S. I shall miss her guided tours. I hope she continues to write.

We had a drowning at L’Houmeau this week. A 62 year old man from the village. He was taken ill while swimming. It’s lovely to swim in this heat, but people must remember to get used to the water slowly.